Heh-heh. Im still a little bummed. I was actually thinking . . . wow, what a great idea. See, Im NOT wedded to my phone all the time. My kids routinely get on my case for never turning it on. But the ability to ask a question and get an answer . . . that was kind of cool until I got a gander at the limitations. (And for those of you who wanted to change the name from Alexa to something like HAL . . . forget it. The only other wake word currently programmed into the thing is Amazon. Figures. This is the little fact-sheet I got with the email just now: The Amazon Echo Team How long is my invitation valid? Due to the high number of requests, invitations expire after seven days. When will I get my Amazon Echo? Once youve added Echo to your Shopping Cart and proceeded to checkout, youll see the estimated delivery date for your order. Can I get a second Echo? Can I help a friend who has requested an invitation get one now? Unfortunately, not at this time. Due to the overwhelming customer response, weve been able to fulfill only a small portion of the invitations requested, and Echo is limited to one per customer. What music services can I listen to with Echo? With Prime Music, Amazon Prime members can listen to over a million songs for free. You can also play music youve purchased or imported into your Amazon Music library. Plus, you can listen to thousands of radio stations and podcasts through iHeartRadio and TuneIn, and we will be adding more music services soon. You can also stream other music services to Echo from your phone or tablet via Bluetooth. What can I use as the wake word? The default wake word is Alexa (our homage to the library of Alexandria). You can also change the wake word to Amazon in the settings section of the Echo companion app. Well be adding more wake words in the future. How does Echo recognize the wake word Alexa? Echo uses on-device keyword spotting to detect the wake word, and the wake word only. When Echo detects the wake word, it lights up. Echo then uses the processing power of Amazon Web Services to recognize and respond to your request. Will Echo understand me all the time? No, the state-of-the-art technology for computer understanding of natural language doesnt yet enable understanding all the time—but because Echos brains are in the cloud, it will keep getting smarter. What cant Echo do yet? Echo cant yet provide services like traffic information, sports scores, or answers to current affairs questions. Stay tuned—were working on these and many more, and will let you know as we add more capabilities. How do I give feedback? You can always provide feedback through the Amazon Echo app, and from time to time we may email you for feedback about specific Echo features. Do I have to charge Echo? No. Echo is always on, uses wall power, and doesnt need to be charged. Im a software developer, can I develop services for Echo? Wed love to hear your ideas for what you might build for Echo. Contact us at echo-developers@amazon Whats the first thing I should ask Echo? You could ask Echo for weather information or a flash briefing. Ask Echo for the meaning of life, or to open the pod bay doors. Or just ask Echo to play some music. Echo might not always have the answer, but we hope youll have fun helping Echo get smarter. Or not. The way it was marketed, Echo was already smart. Too bad.
Posted on: Mon, 08 Dec 2014 17:27:22 +0000
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